The Perfectionists: How Precision Engineers Created the Modern World

by Simon Winchester

Time is the longest distance between two places. —TENNESSEE WILLIAMS, THE GLASS MENAGERIE (1944)

There are now more transistors at work on this planet (some 15 quintillion, or 15,000,000,000,000,000,000) than there are leaves on all the trees in the world. In 2015, the four major chip-making firms were making 14 trillion transistors every single second.

In Japan it is more: precision in all things—not least in everyday railway services of such legendary punctuality that an apology had to be offered late in 2017 when an express left twenty seconds early—can be thought of as part of the national religion.

Perfection is the child of time. —BISHOP JOSEPH HALL, WORKS